[lbo-talk] re: Getting Straight On The Labor Theory of

andie nachgeborenen andie_nachgeborenen at yahoo.com
Thu Dec 23 19:23:24 PST 2004


I agree with abolishing the wages system, just not markets in conusmer and producer goods. What makes me a liberal is that I support liberal democracy: competitive election, multiparty democracy, extensve civil and political liberties, and a government that is as neutral as it can be on competing conception.

I won't get into s discussion of market socialism. (You can look up past exchanges in the archives.) Years of experiences teacges that is a black hole. If you are actually interested, I recommend David Schweickart's short book After Capitalism. Since no nonmarket alternative has any realistic propsect of ever being realiszedk, you shoukd become familiar with the best version of it in outlines.

Please knock off the shit about me "pontificating," before I start to reply in kind. You're pretty annoying yourself, and extremely condescending. I'm a bit too old and tired too put put with smart-assery from a half-educated knowitall. Sorry if I speak bluntly. But you are reasonably intelligent, and if you can be civil, I will be happy to exchange ideas with you. Except about market socialism.

--- Mike Ballard <swillsqueal at yahoo.com.au> wrote:


>
> From: andie nachgeborenen
> <andie_nachgeborenen at yahoo.com>
>
> Justin wrote:
> So, you don't actually believe that the producers
> should own the product of his labor in virtue of
> having produced it, but for the consequentialist
> reasons that his now owning it (collectively, I
> presume)has bad effects. That's a very different
> point. The first argument would hold that the
> effects,
> good or bad, don't matter.
> ******************************************
> Mike B) responds:
>
> I think that the producers (known these days as the
> workers) should own the social product of their
> labour
> in common.
> ********************************
> Justin pontificated:
> Btw, my objection to your "thus" has nothing to do
> with market socialism. It's just an observation that
> the conclusion is not necessitated by the premises.
> "The notion of "following to mew but not to you"
> makes
> no sense. Logical validity is objective. An argument
> follows or it doesn't in virtue of its logical form.
> Your opinion of the matter is a never no mind.
> ***************************************
> Mike B)
> Thanks for the logic lesson, comrade Baas.
> *************
> Justin:
> I happen to agree that in a apitalist socirty social
> wealth presents itself as a vat collection of
> commodities. That does not follow from the fact that
> capitalists own most of the property.
> ******************************
> Mike B):
> No, it doesn’t follow. What follows is that workers
> sell their skills on the labour market for a price.
> Assuming supply and demand are working in a free
> market, the workers get a fair price for their
> skills
> e.g. garbage men get less for their labour than
> stockbrokers. So, the labourer’s skills are sold as
> a
> commodity to the buyer–the capitalist. The
> capitalist
> finds use-value in these skills, employing the
> worker
> to create wealth which the capitalist can
> appropriate
> and sell on the market as commodities. So, it’s all
> fair. The worker sells her skills for a price and
> the
> capitalist (through his magnificent entrpreneurial
> skill and guesswork vis a vis the market) sells the
> product of the workers’ labour whom he has employed.
>
> That social product, which the capitalist owns, is
> sold and voila! The wealth of the societies under
> capitalist domination appears as a vast accumulation
> of commodities.
>
> *********
> Justin continued:
>
> You need genralized market exvhange for generalized
> commodification, private property isn't enough.
> Market
> socialism is a point in case: there you have no
> private property, but genralized market exchange, so
> in that situation the wealth of society presents
> itself as a vast collection of commodities although
> the capitalists do not own it.
> *****************************
> Mike B)
> So, under “market socialism” who owns the wealth
> which
> the producers create?
> Is the workers’ labour power still marketed as a
> commodity for wages under your version of "market
> socialism"?
> I would assume that if it is, that you would reject
> Marx’s call on workers to inscribe on their banner,
> “Abolition of the wages system”. And that is what
> makes you a liberal, comrade?
> ********************
>
> Justin:
>
> I suspect that what you really mean is that you
> think
> it is bad that social wealth should be commodified.
> **********************************************
> Mike B)
> I think that it leads to the fetishism of
> commodities
> and a lot of other brakes on freedom. Commodity
> production is the soil from which classes grow.
> ************************
>
> I don't, and here my market socialism really does
> matter. It does not follow, however, from the fact
> that social wealth is commodified that that
> situation
> is bad. Yes, I know hwy you think it i bad. I am
> just
> pointng out that you need more premises to get there
> -- premises with which I disagree.
> *************************************
>
>
> I realize that you disagree with the notion of
> abolishing the wages system, comrade.
>
> Communist greetings,
> Mike B)
>
> =====
>
*******************************************************************
> Wage-slaves of the world unite! Reclaim the social
> product of your labour. Claim your free-time--it's
> your life. There is power is classwide
> organization. You have nothing to lose but your
> bosses and who needs them anyway?
>
> http://profiles.yahoo.com/swillsqueal
>
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